Icarus and Calypso
by Kathrin J Pearl
Summary: Sometimes you wake up. Sometimes the fall kills you. And sometimes, when you fall, you fly. -Neil Gaiman


**A/N: I did some playing around with their stories, but these characters are based on the mythological Greek Icarus and Calypso.** **It can be read as romance or just friendship depending on what you prefer.**

**Also the summary of "Sometimes you wake up. Sometimes the fall kills you. And sometimes, when you fall, you fly." is a quote from Neil Gaiman (i.e. not mine). **

**Icarus**

He had been young and foolish. After years trapped his desire for freedom had been too great. He was given wings. And he flew. Flew high and fast. The escape was heady. He reached the heavens. Hot wax dripped down his back as the wings disconnected. The he fell. Harder and faster and freer than flight. He was unable to appreciate it as he stared into the mass of water that would soon be his grave. He closed his eyes as he sped through the sky. He hit the water and felt it close over his body as he drowned. The boy did not even struggle. The sea was too vast to fight. There was nowhere to swim to. His world went black.

_Calypso_

She sat at the edge of her island and prison, sighing as she fished in another. She was surprised that she bothered. By now she generally left them to die. Perhaps it was that this one intrigued her. She had seen him fall from the sky, wings slipping from his back. His eyes wide for a few moments, finally closing as he was a foot from the waves. She dragged the body into her mansion, and laid him on the extra bed. A bed which had been used by innumerable other heroes before. Her island seemed like a beacon for heroes lost in ocean. She stared at him, pale skin, and blue eyes. Frail and underfed. She had a few moments to analyze the strange young man before he woke, coughing water out of his lungs.

**Icarus**

His eyes opened; he found himself on an island. A tall girl with long black hair stared at him intently.

"Hello, she greeted, "My name is Calypso. Who are you, hero?"

"I am called Icarus, but I am no hero. I was kept prison with my father, Daedalus. He was trapped by King Minos for saving Theseus from the Labyrinth. The King stuck us in the impenetrable Labyrinth my father himself had made. But my father was blessed by Athena to build the Labyrinth and she blessed him again so that we could escape it. He created wings so that we could reach freedom. He warned me not to fly so high but I disregarded him and flew too close to the sun. Apollo melted the wax which attached the wings to my back and I fell to the sea. Thank you for saving me. If I could trouble you to lend me boat to return to mainland, I would be in your debt."

_Calypso_

She gazed into his hopeful face. Wondering how to tell him that he may have merely reached a new trap, "I have no boat," she confessed, "This island is my prison upon which I am given temptation. Mortal men, until you always heroes, have come and gone during their quests. They are eventually saved from my island by their companions. You will be stuck here until your father comes to save you." She wished that they were as tempted by her as she was by them. The heroes brought her companionship but they never stayed. None of them needed her like she needed them. This one would want to leave even more, having just escaped his own confinement. The not-hero, Icarus, had even less reason to stay with her. She doubted immortality would appeal to him if he was still imprisoned. Not after he had been in Thanatos' easy embrace.

**Icarus**

Calypso looked at him with heartbreak in her eyes. She expected him to vanish, just as others had.

"Why are you caged?"

"For my fathers' sins," she sneered, "_He_ was a Titan and the Olympians punish _me_." Then he understood. She, like him, had been trapped by her father's enemies. Unlike him she had no companion. No steady comforter like his father had been, instead she suffered as heroes passed like flighty hummingbirds.

"You don't think I will stay?" Her eyes dropped, and he thought he saw the sheen of hidden tears, "the heroes always do."

"Then it's a good thing I'm not a hero," he smiled as her eyes met his hopefully.

_Calypso_

Her breath stuttered in shock at his words. He would stay? With her? In a prison?

"You won't be freed from here by death," she warned, "this island is out of time. You will be immortal."

"I don't mind an eternity with you. This cage is beautiful and we have each other for company. We can enjoy it together," his words were spoken with happy sincerity and they lightened her heart. An eternity, never alone again.


End file.
